A variety of products are dispensed from aerosol containers. While many of these products are delivered as fine mists or sprays, some are delivered as foams or gels, particularly shaving products and hair mousses. Such foams or gels typically expand when exposed to air. When such products are dispensed using a conventional aerosol container and actuator cap, a small amount of product may remain in the cap's outlet conduit after the dispensing, downstream of the can valve. This residual product then slowly expands between uses, often creating an unsightly “drool” from the end of the outlet.
Some actuator caps have been provided with pivotable lids (e.g. a lid connected by a living hinge to the main cap). The lids could be swung in front of, and sometimes into, the aerosol outlet, to plug or otherwise close off the outlet between uses. See e.g. U.S. Pat. Nos. D316,675, 2,982,448, and 3,510,029. This reduced the incidence of drool, and provided the consumer with an additional sense of security regarding the integrity of the product about to be delivered.
However, such flip-down lids either required an unsightly projection for the consumer to grip onto (in order to move the lid from the blocking position), or required a finger nail or tool to be used to pry the lid open. This frustrated the ability of the assembly to be a self-contained structure and/or created an unsightly design, and/or created a risk that the consumer's finger nail might break, and/or created a problem for the stackability of the designs (e.g. on a retailer's shelf).
Other approaches have been tried to close the outlet of aerosol caps. See e.g. U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,642,179, 5,105,988 and 6,405,898. However, these structures were complex and unduly costly.
Another concern is that for some types of product delivered from such aerosol containers, some consumers strongly prefer not to have their hands positioned near the outlet of the container when prying a lid off. For example, if the container contains an insecticidal gel consumers might prefer to be able to open the lid without having the consumer's hand near the outlet for the dispensed material. Unfortunately, some prior lid constructions required contact with the lid quite near the outlet in order to pry the lid open.
A need therefore still exists for aerosol caps with anti-drool protection that are inexpensive to manufacture, yet easy for a consumer to use.